White Men Can't Jump is a good game, but not a great one - at times, the action can get too chaotic for some players. The dynamic camera view is catchy but slightly flawed, and the sounds are merely passable. Yet in the end, it is a decent title; players who like rough-and-tumble action and those looking for a good Jaguar party game will be satisfied with this cartridge.

Oh, boy. What am I playing here? This game is not pleasing to see or hear. The whole perspective of the game gets a bit confusing and hard to play with jerky player movements - especially when it's not well animated. It's really hard to see what you're doing and I'm getting tired of the all-out gorilla ball. I rather stick to real NBA-style b-ball. This game didn't cut it at all, didn't have any air in it.

40

GamePro (US)

While Men Can't Jump never lives up to the fun of the movie. It's a major b-bal disappointment and ranks among Ishtar as a move-to-game conversion.

30

Electric Playground

No, No, No, No, No, No, No!!!!!!! This is NOT how you generate more interest in an already ailing system. Whoever let this half finished game out of the gate should have their hands slapped. White Men Can't Jump has no reason to exist whatsoever. It was a fairly decent film about a couple of street basketball hustlers and their adventures but this game bares no resemblance to either the movie or the game of basketball.

None of the actors appear in the game, and their character names aren't even referenced. Instead, the license is attached to a recreation of generic two-on-two street ball tournaments. Think NBA Jam, without the famous names and in a pseudo-3D perspective. I'll give it this, it's original, and it's a look that could not have been pulled off on other consoles of the time. It is, however, a little flashier than it can handle. Like Snipes' character in the film, it would rather play badly as long as it looks good doing it.

Low viewpoint, jerky movement, inconsistent control and hard-to-distinguish players.
The best way to play in general seems to be to hammer on the 'punch' and 'jump' buttons at random when you're not in possession, then when you get the ball, run around aimlessly for a while until a gap appears that you can try a shot in. In one- or two-player mode, any cleverer strategy is repeatedly scuppered by the Jaguar seemingly switching which player you're actually controlling on a whim.
The fast-moving, exciting atmosphere of two-on-two is also somewhat dissipated by the ponderous, incredibly quiet music and the repetitive overuse of five or six half-hearted speech samples.
The final blow is struck by a colour scheme that paints a dull, gloomy, oppressive dark blue sky over every location, even the sun-kissed beachside court.
White Men Can't Jump is a nice idea, but ultimately it's just another game that'll make non-Jaguar owners laugh at you in the street.

This game is actually worse than games that are bad from start to finish because it had so much potential, but Atari decided that they didn't need to spend a few days finishing it off and instead rushed this horrible game to market. Don't get lured in by the graphics, sound, control or initial thoughts of gameplay. Avoid this game like the plague. It gets the overall rating of 5% only because it comes with a packed in Team Tap that you can use for NBA Jam.

The flat, blocky backgrounds wouldn't even cut the mustard on an NES game. Adding insult to injury, this is one of only two Jaguar games to support the multitap (the other being NBA Jam TE), and I could barely get the thing to work! I've played thousands of video games in my time, but I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a game LESS than White Man Can't Jump.